Thursday, 29 September 2011

Amanda Knox as Fallen Angel

So this is the latest humdinger picture of Amanda Knox. I don't know if she is guilty or not guilty but this is what Carlo Pacelli, the prosecuting lawyer said below. Sadly for Carlo, his comments do kind of point in the opposite direction from which he wants them to point. Carlo needs a strong dose of the old bromides, he's getting a bit hot under the collar here. I bet he has a messy fridge! And we know where that can lead.

More old posts on trial by photography here, the seven deadly narratives of women criminals here and the Myra Hindley mugshot here.

He then told the court that the woman
before them appeared to be charming, intelligent, and ‘angel faced
because she has spent four years in jail’.

He added: ‘She is the daughter everyone wants, so you need to know what she was like four years ago.

‘She was a diabolical, Satanic,
demonic she-devil. She was muddy on the outside and dirty on the inside.
She has two souls, the clean one – you see her before you – and the
other.

‘She is borderline. She likes alcohol,
drugs and she likes hot, wild sex.’ Knox’s father Curt and stepfather
Chris Mellas shook their heads as Mr Pacelli’s description was
translated for them while Knox herself looked intently at the judge and
jury.

I have no idea if guilty or innocent but what has always intrigued me about this case is how the focus is on Knox and not Sollecito (& the man serving time already, see, don't know his name unless I look it up) .. it's as if we still find it hard to believe that women are incapable of horrific acts .. we seem to only be comfortable in portraying women as victims and not aggressors. And yet when they are seen as the aggressor we seem to go back to a medieval mentality .. I suppose if they could have burnt her at the stake they would have.

I know what you mean but it is the way that women are treated when they are suspected of horrific acts. I saw the film Bandit Queen recently - about a woman who committed horrific acts. I enjoyed it but it does bring to mind what you are saying - the way Phoolan Devi was diminished in the film, her acts trivialised. This is what Arundhati Roy had to say on the matter -

http://www.sawnet.org/books/writing/roy_bq1.html

Take the time and read it - the film is pretty good and worth seeing, the director's arrogance notwithstanding, but everything Roy says is also true.